Nokia E65 Review

Launched at the 3GSM congress in Barcelona in February 2007, E65 is the first enterprise-oriented slider Nokia phone, characterized by its smaller size and more attractive looks. Just like the other models from the E-series, it puts the emphasis on business functionality, but it looks differently from the huge E90 and E61(i); when placed next to it, the latter two phones look enormous. An elegant slider, Е65 succeeds in accommodating a 3G moduleand a WiFi wireless receiver, thus becoming a real pocket computer.

The set includes:

• Stereo headphones
• Carrying pouch
• Computer connection cable
• Software CD with instructions for use.

Design:

Nokia Е65 is an offspring of the E-series phones, in love with a slider. Unlike most other phones in this form-factor, it is not targeted either to the multimedia, or to the designer vision; it is designed to work and this looks rather serious, compared to other slider models. It does not mean that it is unseemly – quite on the contrary, it is elegant, but in a more conservative way.


Its appearance is characterized by a shiny frame and keys on the front panel; the rest of it is covered in plastic, which feels like rubber. The phone’s back has a texture that allows you to hold it conveniently even with wet hands. It opens pleasurably, thanks to the strong spring mechanism, but the inconvenience is that there is nowhere you can put your finger, since the upper slider is full with keys and you can either press some of them or you can push the lowed edge. Anyway, unlike the clamshell phones, you can open and close this one single-handedly. The sliding mechanism, just like the phone itself, is solidly made and gives you no reason for concerns: it all feels like a business phone. The only strange thing is the snapping sound that is clearly audible if you push the slider more abruptly when opening/closing the phone.

Е65 is offered in two color patterns: brown and red, intended for the gentlemen and for the ladies, respectively.

Model	Dimension (Inches)	Dimension (MM)	Weight (OZ)	Weight (Gramms)
Nokia E65	4.1" x 1.9" x 0.6"	105 x 49 x 15.5	4,0	115
Nokia E60	4.5" x 1.9" x 0.67"	115 x 49 x 17	4,1	117
Nokia E50	4.4" x 1.7" x 0.6"	113 x 43.5 x 15.5	3,7	104
HTC S710 VOX	4.0" x 2.0" x 0.7"	101 x 50 x 17.7	4,2	120

The phone’s upper panel is beveled at about 60 degrees and, typically for a Nokia, the power button, which is also a shortcut for changing the profiles, is located in the curved part of the upper slider. Under it are the speaker and the sensor, correcting the lighting of the display (at different levels) and the keyboard (on/off). Nokia’s logo and the model „E65” are almost invisible.

Naturally, the display is also located here, with the resolution, typical for the QVGA class and 16 million colors, which is a standard, imposed by the other Nokia phones. Its size of 2.24 is smaller than that of the multimedia phones, but it’s nevertheless useful for reading documents and emails. At bright sunlight its glass becomes reflecting and the images are more difficult to make out, but still stay comparatively visible.



Under it are the 10 buttons and the D-pad. The availability of 4 shortcuts is at the expense of the small button sizes and therefore important buttons like answer/reject, menu and the soft buttons are small, which is simply illogical. We could live with the two receivers, since their functions are dubbed by opening/closing the slider, but we would still rather they shared the place, occupied by the shortcuts. The D-pad is typically located in the middle. It is easy to press and you are unlikely to get any direction wrong.



The numbers keys on the lower slider are small and narrow because of the slider’s rails on the left and on the right, but they are nevertheless convenient for use. They are bulging in the middle and feel soft to press, with a real tactile response. The keyboard on the front panel is backlit in white which small exceptions which are colored differently thus making it perfectly visible in the dark. Some people might have problems pressing the upper row of keys due to the small distance between them and the upper slider, which can easily be hit with the fingers.



It is somehow illogical that all side keys are on the right, because thus they are too close one next to the other. The Voice Record button, the edit (pencil) and the volume rocker are all one and only the sound control rocker can be felt, because it is bulging, but it is hard to press.

Alone on the back panel are the lens of the 2-megapixel camera. There is neither a flash, not a small mirror to keep them company there.

Further down on the back is the battery lid that has to be removed in order for the microSD cards slot to be reached. At least those can be changed without switching the phone off. However, this would not be possible for the sim card, which is under the BL-5F battery with a 1000 mAh capacity.


Looked from below, E65 reminds us of the producer’s older models, because it uses a PopUp Connector and a separate charger. This requires the use of a particular type of cable for computer connection and headphones, rather than the standard miniUSB and 2.5/3.5mm stereo jacks.

Interface:

Although it was launched in 2007, quite a long time after N95 (the first Symbian 9.2 phone with S60), Е65 uses the older 9.1 version which is a totally negative thing. It is illogical that new models of such upmarket phones use the outdated version of the operating system.

Using the Active Standby mode, the home screen would be the typical one for all Symbian phones. It displays a clock and the date, as well as the usual signal strength and battery, while the name of the carrier or Offline can be seen in the middle. Just below these is located a row of 6 shortcuts which can be personalized to suit you best. The rest of the display, below them, is used for “notifications” – this is where missed calls, upcoming tasks (or To-Do in the calendar), received messages are displayed, as well as the music player status (the song that’s played at the moment). The various capabilities of this Active Desk can be set to serve you best. It resembles a well-personalized homescreen of a Pocket PC with Windows Mobile OS and is really useful and pleasant to use, and it saves a lot of time. Located at the bottom of the screen are the two software buttons which can also be personalized from the Settings menu.

The main menu can be viewed as 3x4 (or 4x3) grid of icons that can also be displayed as a list (it’s chosen directly from the main menu) but the icons are not animated in both cases. The numeric keypad buttons can be used as shortcuts – a function which is much better implemented than version 6 of the S60 interface but still a lot of things should be changed: as the menu not always holds 12 icons (they can be more or less), scrolling up/down shows you different ones that should be associated with the keypad – but they’re not. If you press 3 while at the highest part of the grid, you’ll select the icon located at the top right corner. But if you scroll down to reveal the other icons in this menu, pressing the 3 button will still open the afore-mentioned menu, not the one currently located at the top right of your screen; so these shortcuts only relate to the first 12 icons in a particular menu, while the rest (if there are any) remain without any shortcuts. If a button’s function is dynamic and corresponds to the grid in the menu, you can click the button for a given menu without even thinking about it. Thus, you save the time you usually need to “walk around” the menus, using the joystick.

The menu can be personalized by using themes, and if you combine various screensavers and personalized homescreens, two identical phones can look quite different. Definitely, the operating system provides many good personalization options, so it can be compared to the most advanced system, according to us – Windows Mobile for Pocket PCs.

Phonebook:

This business phone is equipped with a hardware shortcut on the upper slider to make reaching the list of phone numbers faster. The other shortcuts are for mute/unmute, Conference call and Own key, whose function you can adjust as you like.

All the contacts are displayed as a list and if there is a picture ID, it can be seen in the top left corner of the screen as a thumbnail with a very small size (it’s the same size when you have an incoming call and that’s why we find this feature useless) when you select the contact. If you want to search, you type in directly from the keypad and searching is done for the whole name (not only the first word), even if the name is saved in more than one field (first and last name for example). If you want to edit a contact , you can only change the already defined fields. For adding more information you need to select the Add Detail menu. When adding a new contact you are provided with the “basic” fields, but with the “Add Detail” function you have almost no restrictions on the fields and their number and you can add a lot of phone numbers.


We also like having the option for adding a given field several times and in that manner for example we are able to record the numbers of three phones each one with a status “Mobile”.

The phone has a set of voice commands – they are speaker independent and you don’t have to “train” every command, something that can save you a lot of precious time. By holding the right soft key, the “recognizer” turns on and you can say a name (from the phonebook) to be dialed. Names like “Father”, “Brother”, “test”, “John” and “Neo” were no problem, but we had no success with others like “Amy” for example.

The commands can activate various programs or perform different functions, like “New SMS” for example, but a list with different capabilities must be added to the menu - not all of them are added by default so that they’re easier to recognize with any speaker – thus by adding only the ones you need you can achieve best possible accuracy without the annoying training. Аnd it works, the voice commands were very accurate and we rarely experienced mistakes when launching applications.

A voice recorder can record your voice by the means of speakerphone as the duration of the recording is limited only by the available memory. You can record on the memory card, which will allow longer recording times. In that way the smartphone replaces your voice recorder without needing a third party software.

Organizer:

The organizer is an important part of a business phone and E65 has paid due attention to these functions. When opening the menu you are positioned by default on the calendar, which has preserved the functionality of its Symbian fellows. You can add 4 types of entries (Meeting/Memo/Anniversary/To-do), to select Subject, Location,Start/End Time and connect an alarm.



In the Office menu you will find other applications, part of the organizer. By the File manager you can view the phone memory and the memory card and copy/move files. Like other phones using this operating system, the calculator does not have scientific functions and the converter doesn’t have the most attractive interface but it works. Notes is for short notes without alarms and reminders.

Preloaded you have a QuickOffice to view Word/Excel/Powerpoint files, and to be able to edit them you will have to order a full version (Quickoffice v3 (activate editing) full license for EUR9.79 or 30-day license for EUR2.26 or Quickoffice Premier (v4 upgrade + editing) full license for EUR15.06). The inconvenience with Quickoffice is that it opens files saved only in the Documents folders of the memory of the phone and the card. Still, if you reach a file through the file browser and select it, it will be opened by the program. A complex Excel file is visualized OK and searching in it is easy, too. We only had a problem with a PowerPoint file where not all images were visualized properly.


Adobe PDF takes care for viewing of the pdf documents in your phone’s memory. Like with the office applications, we loaded a 50 pages document (and over 1 MB) and searched through it without any problems.

The office files are often received with the e-mails archived in series and that is why the phone is supplied with a ZIP manager, which can zip/unzip files. Our remark to it is that it does not handle RAR archives which are also very widespread.

The Search option allows you to search in your Messages/E-mails/Calendar events/To-dos/Notes/Contacts/Other files which is very convenient. Thus you can find contacts by (part of) a word, coinciding with their profession or company, files in the phone memory, etc. This is an excellent system which must be present in all smart (and not only) phones, but which unfortunately we find in E-series only but not in N (even N95).

In Clock you will see the exact time and date and like with other similar smartphones, here you can add an alarm. It is only one, without a possibility for repetition which is certainly very inconvenient and you will almost certainly want to replace it with a third party application. The worldclock is in the next tab where you can add arbitrary cities.

As a phone of the E-series, E65 comes with several more extra applications, not available in the other Symbian S60 phones. Teams is an application which makes it easy for you to conduct a conference conversation/send a message or use PushToTalk with a preset group of people differentiated as Team.

Messaging:

For a phone to function as a mobile office, it must be able to handle messages very well. Like the other Symbian phones, in the Messaging menu you will find everything arranged. By the New Message button you can start writing a text/multimedia or e-mail message. The T9 system can help you input text faster. It works very easy which is typical of Nokia phones.

Inbox is a shared box for the received text and multimedia messages as well as for messages received via Bluetooth. Unlike the N-series, here the headings of the individual letters are visualized by smaller font so that more can be fitted on a single screen. This is so because it is assumed that the business users use/receive lots of messages and should be able to view them faster.

The email is set by means of a Wizard which saves you a lot of writing by automatically ‘completing’ part of the settings. If you know how to configure your e-mail, this will take one to two minutes and then you will be able to use it in your phone. You can preset your phone to download headers only and then a whole message when you want to view it, or download up to a fixed limit (a limit in KB set by you) or directly download the whole letters together with the attached files. We made the settings using the first possibility and downloaded separate messages via WiFi or using the UMTS operator’s net.

To save your time, the phone can read your messages aloud. The Меssage reader is in the Office folder and when you start it, it will show the messages in the Inbox so that you can select the one you want it to start reading from. It reads them a little fast, but clearly enough for you to understand. A great inconvenience is that each time the sound volume is at the average level and you have to increase it manually which is not then saved as a setting. Even the highest volume level of the speakerphone will not be enough if you are in a noisy environment.

Connectivity:

Nokia E65 is a four-band GSM phone which can operate in the GSM networks on every continent and use EDGE for Internet connection. But since EDGE is comparatively slow connection, a third generation of UMTS is supported allowing for much higher speeds of data transfer via the network. Unfortunately, only the 2100MHz is supported which makes the use of 3G in America impossible.

Bluetooth is used for local connection which surprisingly is not the last version 2, but 1.2. It does not support multimedia profiles which according to Nokia are not necessary for a business phone. The connection to a computer is by the cable of the set to a USB port and by selecting one of two regimes: PC Suite, in which you synchronize with the software of Nokia or Data Transfer, where the memory card is recognized as a mass storage device, to/from which you can copy files from/to your computer. The connection speed in this regime is about 770KBps, which means that 5MB (a MP3 song on the average) will be transferred in 7 seconds.

With synchronization, you can use the PC Suite of the set or download a newer version from the Internet site of Nokia. We used the same version we had used with Nokia N76 without any problems. The synchronization of 140 entries (contacts & calendar entries) took us 18 seconds, which is a good speed.

E65 supports WiFI 802.11b/g which is standard for a wireless LAN network. By the link in the active standby screen you can find and connect to networks whose range covers you and use Internet connection via them. This is very convenient because you don’t depend on the operator’s coverage.

Internet:

Thanks to the UMTS data and the QVGA resolution of the display, loading and viewing a standard HTML web pages is easy job. The phone has no problem rendering all pages and reading phoneArena's news was a pleasure. Scrolling left-to-right and top-to-bottom is done with the phone's d-pad, and a mini-map shows you, which part of the page you are looking at. The pages loaded pretty fast and as a whole, we had a great experience with the browser, so we definitely like it more than the Internet Explorer, built in Pocket PC phones based on Windows Mobile. The browser can load RSS feeds for even faster access to information.


What we also loved about it is the history: when you use 'back' to see pages you've seen earlier, you see the pages as thumbnails, you can open from the phone's cache.

Camera:

The camera is started in 3.5 seconds and then you are faced with its definitely unattractive interface. It differs from the interface of the multimedia N-series and resembles that of the Symbian 6 phones and is the same as that used in E50. Thus the manufacturer wants to show that this is not a multimedia phone and defines another difference between the E and N-series.

The camera's interface does not even take up the whole display and the Viewfinder only occupies half of it, while the options available are color effects, white balance and night mode, which almost useless.

We are not positively surprised by the photos quality but still they are good to use. Colors, which are unsaturated and unrealistic, are a disadvantage. Immediately after the light grows weaker, noise appears which kills part of the details.




By pressing the right direction you will switch to video recording regime whose maximum resolution of 352x288 (CIF) is a proper achievement expected to be used on a computer. Actually, the quality is such that the videos are usable but the high compression is felt by the appearing artifacts clearly seen in the moving objects.

Nokia E65 sample video at 352x288 pixels resolution

The gallery in which you view the photos already taken is again not like that of the N-series, but just visualizing a list of small thumbnails. In full-screen view the phone fails to rotate the photos if taken in opposite orientation and shows them with large white fields.

Multimedia:

The music player is just like that of the other Symbian 9.1 phones (N73, N93i, etc) and allows sorting your music by artist/album/genre/composer/track list (most played/recent/recent additions). The “Now Playing” interface has its peculiarities and, in order to be able to use its potentialities, you have to “navigate” on small icons and not like in the more recent version, where you can control everything with the d-pad’s five directions.


To listen to the MP3/MP4/AAC audio files you can use both the loudspeaker,offering average volume of not particularly high quality, and wire headphones. The model from the set is one of the simplest, offered by the producer, but you can use other models that can be connected to the PopPort or an interconnect.


The Real Video player can open 3GP and MP4 files; with the H.263 code, rather than with the 264. MP4 H263 video with QVGA resolution you can view the files comfortably, without cutting or losing frames, which was a surprise for us, given the comparatively slow processor.

Software:

You have 50MB of available memory in your phone and if this is not enough, you can increase it by a microSD card. Nokia claims that the user avails of about 24MB RAM memory and a 220MHz ARM9 processor.

The phone can use applications based both on the Java platform and Symbian S60, which provides wide 3rd party software compatibility. Installation is a piece of cake, while additional programs increase the phone's capabilities and it can be personalized to better suit you.

Preloaded with the phone come printing applications (Printers & HP printer) and Screen export, enabling you to transfer the images from your phone’s screen to another device (whether a projector, a screen or other).

Performance:

Apart from using the older version of its operating system, Е65 has been ‘punished’ also by a slow processor (just 220 MHz), that you become aware of when you browse in its menus: it is far slower than N76 and 6120, using Symbian v9.2 and 369МHz processors and reacting almost instantaneously. Е65’s speed is rather comparable with the older models like N73, N80, etc.

During the test E65 froze only once and it re-started itself almost immediately.

Naturally, the most important feature for a phone is how it performs as such: whether you can use it when the signal is weak, how it sounds during conversation and how long its battery can last. Untypically for a Nokia business phone, Е65 has a comparatively weak Signal Reception and we have awarded it 4.75 out of 10 (average) after we have tested it in our test zone. This is strange, keeping in mind Nokia’s good name when it comes to reception.

Nokia claims that the battery can last for 6 hours of conversation, but our test has showed different results: 4 hours 15 minutes, which makes 70% of the duration, promised by the producer. However, this is not a bad performance, compared to other smartphones - 4 hours is above the average, but for someone who spends a lot of time on the phone this would mean that they would have to charge the phone daily.

While the latter two factors determine to what extent you’d be able to use your phone under different conditions, the sound quality is critical to make sure you’re heard well on the other end, which is of great importance for a business phone. Nokia Е65 does perfectly well here, its mic has a strong, clear, undisturbed and realistic sound and we have no complaints whatsoever here. You can hear just the same way, but only a little bit less loudly.

Conclusion:

Nokia E65 manages in preserving its functionality of an upmarket phone, including some applications, typical for the E-series, e.g. conference calls, files searching, files printing, etc., making it a small mobile computer, intended for work. Moreover, this functionality is combined with an elegant and contemporary slider design, made of materials that are nice to feel and to see. The comparatively good battery and the extremely good quality of the sound is a huge advantage and the only criticisms concern the weak signal reception, the old version of the operating system and the small keys. It is all a matter of compromise and the compromise made by Е65 is related to its size and design, but we nevertheless like the product as a whole.